Giffords getting rehab in North Carolina

U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, still recovering from a Jan. 8 shot to the head, traveled to North Carolina on Sunday, where she will receive two weeks of specialized rehabilitation, her spokesman said.

The trip to Asheville, N.C., had been planned for several months, said Mark Kimble, describing her travel as "strictly rehabilitation-related." Giffords will see a therapist who has worked with her in Houston and "been extensively involved in the congresswoman’s therapy," he said.

The congresswoman has no scheduled public appearances or events and will give no interviews while on the trip, which will last until Nov. 4, he said.

While Giffords has not indicated whether she is running for reelection, her campaign has continued to raise and spend significant amounts of money.

The congresswoman, yet to speak in public after being shot in the head Jan. 8, will read the last chapter of her joint memoir with her husband, set for release next month.

Giffords will read the last chapter of "Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope," with husband Mark Kelly, a now-retired astronaut, reading the remainder of the book.

The audiobook is slated for release Nov. 15, the same day as the hardcover and digital copies of the book, which is being published by Scribner, an imprint of Simon and Schuster. The memoir was co-written by Jeffrey Zaslow.

The couple's story will be featured in an ABC News prime-time special the night before the book comes out. While the network had touted an on-camera interview with Giffords, her spokesman said last month that the congresswoman hadn't decided whether to appear on the television report.

Giffords has not given an interview since being shot in the head in what authorities charge was an assassination attempt on Jan. 8.

Six were killed and 12 others, besides Giffords, wounded in the mass shooting. Jared Lee Loughner faces 49 federal counts in the shooting, which took place at a "Congress On Your Corner" meet-and-greet with constituents.

A Scribner's spokesman said last month that Giffords and Kelly have not scheduled any other interviews related to the book.

While undergoing rehabilitation in Houston after being shot through the brain, Giffords has made only a few public appearances, and traveled little.

She returned to Tucson over Labor Day weekend, seeing close friends and family and having dinner with staffers from University Medical Center.

She made two trips to Florida to see her husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, command the space shuttle, and also visited Tucson in June.

Her most noteworthy, and public, appearance was to return to Congress on Aug. 1 to cast a vote on the debt ceiling.

She returned to Washington again in early October, for a ceremony marking Kelly's retirement from the Navy.